Days 9 and 10: Camden Town, Hyde Park, and our rather lengthly journey to Bath

Today we left London for Bath, taking the nice and scenic route. I say this with some amount of sarcasm and irony, but that will become clear later. First we had breakfast, and most importantly a cup of tea. After saying our goodbyes we made our way to Paddington station with luggage in tow. At the Paddington station, this nice man told us, "Bath...oh yes...this train. You can use compartment D or C." So we hop onto the train and settle ourselves in. The train was really full, and eventually these guys sit next to us. They were rather smelly. I spent a great deal of time watching the scenery because my nose was farthest away from them when pointed towards the window. After a while, we both fell asleep. When we woke up, we realized that no disaster had befallen us for at least two days and were quite happy with it. Little did we know that the disaster gods were probably laughing their butts off at us. When we next woke up, we were at a place called Castle Cary. Eventually we asked someone if we had passed Bath, and he told us that we were heading away from Bath. "This train, comparment D or C" my ass. We were really really far away from Bath. We got off at the next station (Tauton -- if you can find it on a map, you'll probably be laughing right along with the disaster gods) and eventually made our way to Bath (4 or 5 hours later than we meant to). And it probably wasn't even necessary to sit next to the stinky people. I guess this was disaster enough to cover today as well as the past few days. The disaster gods have been sated, for now.
On a different note, I was talking to some girls on another train. They were seventeen and studying for the driving test, but they looked at least a few years older than I am. For some reason, people here just look more glamorous and seem to grow up faster. On the other end, older people here don't seem to have any objection to wearing outfits that in the US would be considered fitting only for, say, twenty year olds. It's kind of refreshing.
Bath is really nice though. I think Bath is to London as Berkeley is to SF. It's a bit more laid back, less crowded, and, in a word, quaint. A lot of small shops. Oh, and a lot of chocolate places. There a place called Bar Chocolat that I really would like to visit. I finally got my appetite back (it hasn't really been around for the past few days due to a bit of a cold), and we had dinner at a Nepalese restaurant where we tried this interesting dish made with fermented bamboo shoots. I've never tasted anything quite like it before. The spiciness of it finally cleared up my nose, and I feel so unbelievably....relieved, I guess is the word. Unfortunately, between the two of us coughing and blowing our nose, we probably scared off any other prospective customers the restaurant may have had. For dessert we went to the grocery and got ice cream. I tried Green and Black's Orange Chocolate, which was yummy. Not too sweet, and the orange saves it from a cliched chocolate ice cream.

Yesterday we went to Camden Town, where there is a great deal of shopping, then afterwards to Hyde Park. I liked Hyde Park better. It's this absolutely humongous, massive park, and it's full of people running, picniking, sitting around and talking, making out, playing sports, and whatever else one does at a park. We saw people throwing frisbees around, and there was even a volleyball net set up with a game going on. It made me realize how much I miss running, playing volleyball, and frisbee. Not doing some sort of excercise for a whole ten days makes me feel kind of weird. The volleyball people weren't very nice, however, and turned down these guys from New Zealand who asked to play (apparently theirs was a "serious" game), so I didn't ask if I could join. Instead, we went to throw around a frisbee for a while with some other people. Who would have thought...frisbee while on holiday in Hyde Park? I guess it's an international fad. They even have ultimate games in Regent's Park. Throwing a frisbee around is a very relaxing thing to do. It's kind of nice because it's social in that you do it with a bunch of peoople, but you don't really have to make conversation. Awkward silences are automatically eliminated. None of those long, "Soooo.....s" or "Ummm....s." There was a person there who reminded me of someone in Berkeley, but the person in Berkeley usually makes the funky catches he tries while the one here misses them for the most part. There was also a big pond there with these huge swans which were really tame. You could get to a foot and a half away, and it would just give you a look and continue to preen. Clearly, waterproofing its feathers is more important than a few gawking humans. There were also all manners of interesting birds which we hadn't seen before. I wish we could ask Mr. Levine about them, because I'm sure he would know something. So yes, I think that was a good last day in London.